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Retro Radio Show

18.8.07

Music for Sunday Date, Vol. 11

Hi, friends, this is Karel and radio Manzerock is on the air. Today we will tour all over Europe.

Grass skirts and leis, hula-dancing babes with fire in their eyes, tropical nights under the palms... that was how Hawaii appeared to Europeans in the first place. Dozens of bands saluted the islands in music and song.

The Waikikis spearheaded this movement. Behind the scenes, producer Horst Fuchs promoted the band's career and pulled the strings. Composers such as Hans Blum and Michael Thomas created their repertoire. The Waikikis - all of them Belgian studio musicians - sold their colorful island reveries by the millions, and some of the instrumentals made their way into the charts in several countries.

Peter Hinnen was a popular Swiss singer & yoddler. He sang pop songs, country and offcourse he did some pretty rock'n'roll tunes.
"Moonlight-Kss" is a nice version of Douglas Cornell's "Hey, Cool" from 1958 (written by Beverly Ross and Julius Dixon). This version has got German lyrics.

Kilima Hawaiians were founded in 1934 by Aris-Jereke Buijsman and his wife Mary Buijsman. The band played a Dutch variant on the exotic Aloha music. Its heyday the band enjoyed in the 1950s, also in neighbouring Germany. Until 1989 the Kilima Hawaiians performed live concerts.
"A Song of Old Hawaii" was written by Gordon Beecher and Johnny Noble in 1937.

Die Optimisten were formed in 1952 from Peter Alexander, Erni Bieler and Erwin Halletz. All of them soon became the stars of Austrian pop music. Erwin Halletz was a band-leader, he made many top records with Austrian and German singers.
"Jambalaya" was originally written and recorded by Hank Williams in 1951. It means a french fish dish which is very popular in French speaking States of America. German lyrics by Kurt Feltz.

Conny Froboess is a German singer, made her first hit in 1951 and never stopped since then. She starried in many teeenage musical films in the 1950s and 1960s, sang rock'n'roll and pop songs. Here's a 1962 hit "Lady Sunshine".

France Gall, a popular singer, was born in Paris. Her father was lyricist. In the early 1963 he encouraged his daughter to record some songs and send the demos to a musical publisher. In July she was signed with Philips. After the song "Sacré Charlemagne" whose lyrics were penned by her father, was an enormous hit in 1965, selling more than 2 million copies around the world, Gall was then selected to represent Luxembourg for the 1965 Eurovision Song Contest. With the song "Poupée de Cire, Poupée de Son" she took the Grand Prize. And here's a romantic song from her 1966 album.

Four Hawaiians is a Danish quartett with Hawaiian influence. Here's a song "Stop den Lille Kaenguru" ("Stop the Little Kangaroo") wich was recorded in 1963 and released on 7" Columbia Records 45-DD 721 (see the picture sleeve).

L'ensemble de Mescherin is unique in its way. Led by the legendary producer Vyacheslav Mescherin, the ensemble made their first record in 1957, especially for the 6th International Youth Festival in Moscow.
One interesting thing was that the ensemble played on electric instruments only: electric guiars, organs, hammonds, and other nameless experimental instruments. This made them one of the most original and unique groups on the Rusian music scene. Vyacheslav Mescherin was like a pioneer when he experimented with the sound, recording process and instruments, many of which established in music forever.
Music of his ensemble still surprises and sounds original even today. Here's an example of his late recordings, the instrumental track called "On the Beach". It was recorded in 1969 and is a jolly danceable number.

Not only Mescherin was experimenting with space age sounds. Some of the other early electronic recording in Europe were produced in the late 1950s by Dutch composer/keyboard player Tom Dissevelt and technician Kid Baltran. Their 1957 debut album included this composition called "Song of the Second Moon". And in fact, The Electrosonics were Tom Dissevelt and Kid Baltan. Their music was way too experimental in composer way, not very danceable but interesting to listen to.

I like vocal of Anca Agemolu very much. She's from Romania, became popular in the 1960s and recorded some great songs on Electrecord label. Here's a song from the late 1960s.

Hungarian singer Korda György was born in 1939. At the age of 18 he performed at music festival and at the age of 19 started to record songs. His first hit was "Szeretni Kell" in 1958.
Here's an example of his early repertoire - a song that was written by composer Deák Tamás. With Deák Tamás ensemble György recorded many songs, including "Nem Vagyok Ideges". It means "I'm not Nervous" in English.

Ticky Show Quintet was a Swedish instrumental band formed in the 1960s. Led by guitarist Lennart Carlsson they released some nice records. This popular number "C'est Si Bon" was written by French composer Henri Betti back in 1947.